Should I Have Asked Santa for a New Computer for Christmas?

[razorpit]

I'm a newbie and at the same time I've learned a lot over the last two weeks about archiving my DVD's. As strange as it may seem my early attempts were quite successful but lately (just as I've started to get cocky) I have been extremely unsuccessful. To start I stumbled upon and followed the excellent tutorial on the afterdawn site which led me to download and/or purchase the following software:

DVD Rebuilder Version .66a
CCE Basic Version 2.69.01.10
Mpeg2Dec3dg Version 100(?)
DVD Decrypter Version 3.5.1.0
AviSynth 2.5 Version 2.55

My first attempts at archiving worked great. I set everything up just as the tutorial said to do and everything was working like a champ until last week when a repetitive problem showed up during the encoding phase. For some reason my computer locks up while running CCE Basic or QuEnc. And I do mean lock up, the keyboard freezes, the mouse freezes, etc. The only way I can use the machine is by pressing the restart button. Heck, I can't even turn the "pretty" number lock and cap lock lights off and on with the keyboard buttons!

Now my machine is fairly stable. It is as stable as any Windows XP SP1 machine can be. I started my troubleshooting process by first uninstalling a few items like Weather Bug, and turning off others like Norton Anti-Virus and MSN Messenger. I even turned off the "blank" screen saver found in the Windows desktop. No luck, the machine still locked up. From the snooping I did on these forums I downloaded and ran the MS memory checker for 24 hours and it found no errors. I then ran Memtest86 for 24 hours and it found no faults. I then ran Prime95 and as you might guess, it found no faults.

I believe all of the settings in my computer and BIOS are pretty much set as factory standards. I don't get in to overclocking. In other words I don't like to fiddle with what I don't know about. Although my Gigabyte motherboard is old by today's standards (7ZXE) it has the "latest" BIOS flash in it and I have an AMD 2100XP processor in it. As I said before it may be slow but it has always been "steady".

The CPU and system cases are working relatively cool. The CPU never goes above 63 C, which according to AMD shouldn’t be a problem. I have 3 case fans blowing with an Antek 480V power supply connected a to a battery backup APC unit so I'm sure I'm getting clean power. I’ve even left the window open in 20 F weather just to keep it cool in the computer room.

As strange as it may seem, it appears the lock ups occur when I'm away from the machine and it is idle. For example, the entire time I have been writing this DVD Rebuilder has been quietly working in the background and no problems. I can almost guarantee that if I leave this computer and go to work or to bed the stinking thing will be locked up when I return. :-( And remember there is no screen saver running.

I was thinking about removing all but one stick of 512MB ram from the computer because I simply don’t know what the heck else to even try at this point. From a technical stand point when the machine and software doesn't lock up the archived video is simply stunning! Crisp clear audio and video. I just wish it wouldn't lock up. What the heck is going on? Can you please help? Are theree some settings I’m missing? I’ve searched these forums front and back and frustrated at this point.

Thanks,
--Dave

[ammck55]

From what you've described, it seems that your system is stable. At any point in your troubleshooting steps have you done an uninstall/reinstall of all of your ripping software?

ammck55

[razorpit]

I did uninstall and reboot (twice just for the heck of it) and then reinstall DVD Decrypter. I also pulled the ripped files from my PC on to a friends just to see if that wasn't a possibility and the ripped files worked fine on the second PC.

--Dave

[razorpit]

I have been swapping memory in and out and getting the same results, lock-ups. I'm wondering, is it a problem that the source, work, and output directories are all in the same parent directory? Should the work folder be done on a separate drive as the source folder? Could I be overworking the hard drive controller?

[theReal]

The CPU never goes above 63 C, which according to AMD shouldn’t be a problem.

According to my own experience, everything above 50°C makes AMD Athlon processors unstable (that means 50°C board reading - if it's the CPU internal diode reading then you can add some 13°C. Your temps would be fairly all right then but still borderline).
I got a watercooling because of that problem: now I can keep the CPU below 48°C even with 35°C room temperature (and that happens like once a year, usually I have around 22°C room temp and 38°C cpu load temp)

I see you have tested with Prime95 and memtest - I once had the same problem with avisynth (Prime was running fine for hours but avisynth 2.5 made my computer crash). According to one of the developers here on the forum, avisynth 2.5x is so heavily optimized that it might stress your machine more than prime.

Maybe you can also check your memory timings: having them set to standard often means the timings are determined by what the memory's SPD says. These values in the SPD might not be totally true... I for example have Corsair XMS PC2700 memory that is labelled "CAS2-2-2 CMD 1" The bios sets these values as they are in the SPD - however there's no way I can run this memory stable at CMD 1 (I paid extra money for that feature, dammit, but I found out too late so I couldn't return it...)

So, try lowering the temps further (it never hurts) and try different memory timings. If that doesn't help then I have no further ideas.

[razorpit]

Thanks for the tip Real. I was hoping that wasn't the case but I think you are right. I moved all three sets of my memory around in different combinations and just kept getting the same results. I eliminater sticks added some from another PC and had no luck. I'll investigate on cooling "old faithful" but I fear the cost will be more than just biting the bullet and upgrading the motherboard.